Been playing the game, having fun. Wanted to share some nuggets of slightly obscure gameplay wisdom.
Some of these will probably be obvious to some of you, but I've seen a lot of people makes these mistakes or ask questions.
So without further ado:
1 - Hero-specifc controls. If you go to the controls screen there is an easily missed drop-down menu saying "All heroes". You can use it to set hero-specific control schemes if you so desire. More importantly, some heroes have their own options. Notably Mercy who can be set to use her heal/boost as a toggle rather than a button hold and can alter the way her fly-to-friend ability works. Other examples include making wall climbs automatic or making Reinhardt's shield a toggle rather than button hold.
2 - Zarya Bubble Shields. As someone who plays a bunch of Zarya I'm probably cutting my own throat here, but it needs to be said. Her shields, either on herself or projected onto teammates, give complete invulnerability to all damage and crowd control for about 2 seconds. As far as I'm aware they can't be broken by damage unlike a Reinhardt shield or a Winston dome. What's more, any damage they do block charges up Zarya's weapon. So for the love of God, do not shoot enemies with the shield on them. It does nothing but waste your ammo and turn the enemy Zarya into a monster.
3 - The flipside of the previous point is that if you are Zarya you can get easy charge off damage sources that the enemy can't control. For example, pop your shield and stand in front of a Torbjron turret. Or if a DVa ult comes in pop your shield, shield someone else and give the exploding mech a hug. Bam. Instant 100% charge.
4 - Attacks that do not use projectiles cannot be deflected by Genji or absorbed by DVa's defense matrix. This includes Mei's ice spray (but not her secondary fire icicles), Zarya's beam (unsure about her secondary fire), Symmetra's primary beam and mini-turret lasers, Winston's Tesla gun and any kind of melee attack.
5 - Armour. Some heroes have parts of their health bar coloured yellow. That represents armour. Armour HP gives a flat 5 damage reduction to each instance of incoming damage. This makes it highly effective against heroes who do incremental amounts of damage like Winston, Tracer or Symmetra. (So if the enemy is doing the five Winston cheese just pull out a bunch of DVas. She have 400 armour, making her incredibly hard to kill with Winston.) Note that armour does not reduce the damage of each projectile from shotgun blasts, but does do so for each projectile of burst weapons (Genji's shuriken and Lucio's primary fire).
6 - Abilities that prevent you from moving can be used while falling. Notably Roadhog's self-heal and Bastion's transformations and self heal. I like to drop down on enemies from above while activating Bastion's ult or turret mode so the transformation happens in mid air and I'm ready to fire when I hit the ground.
7 - Pharah's concussive shot and Junkrat's mine knock back the person firing them as well as enemies. So if you need to escape from a close quarters situation you can pop one of those suckers at your feet to create distance. Junkrat's own mine will not hurt him and can be used like a rocket jump.
8 - Symmetra's secondary charged shot goes straight through Reinhardt's shield. Good for countering Reinhardts pushing choke points. (Duh.) Reinhardt's own firestrike projectile does the same thing, and also pierces multiple targets.
9 - Mei can reach elevated locations by spawning an ice wall under her own feet. Can also be used to give allies a boost, although that would take a bit of coordination.
10 - Zenyatta cannot be damaged or stunned while his is ulting, but he can be knocked back. You can use a Reinhardt charge, a Pharah concussive blast or similar ability to separate him from his team and deny them the healing effect.
11 - Hanzo's dragon ult can be countered, but only under specific circumstances. When Hanzo ults he fires an arrow that travels about 7 meters before spawning the dragons. The dragons can't be stopped by anything but the initial arrow can neutralized by a DVa or deflected by a Genji for massive style points.
12 - Genji can deflect McCree's stun grenade, the bullet from McCree's ult, the rockets from Pharah's ult and the shrapnel from Roadhog's ult. (Unsure about Reaper ult or Tracer ult.)
13 - Junkrat's Rip-Tire can climb walls. Works the same way as Genji and Hanzo's wall climb abilities.
14 - Reinhardt's ult and the effects of Mei's ult can be blocked by an enemy Reinhardt's shield, Mei's ice wall or Winston's shield dome.
15 - Symmetra's primary beam does increased rate of damage the longer it is hitting someone. There is a charge indicator on the back of her weapon. The damage increase dissipates over time if you stop firing, stop hitting a target or stop to reload but does not go away instantly. This means you can reload or switch targets and maintain heavy damage output.
Hopefully this helps some folks. If anyone has their own to share or can confirm any of the stuff I was unsure of, feel free to share.
Some of these will probably be obvious to some of you, but I've seen a lot of people makes these mistakes or ask questions.
So without further ado:
1 - Hero-specifc controls. If you go to the controls screen there is an easily missed drop-down menu saying "All heroes". You can use it to set hero-specific control schemes if you so desire. More importantly, some heroes have their own options. Notably Mercy who can be set to use her heal/boost as a toggle rather than a button hold and can alter the way her fly-to-friend ability works. Other examples include making wall climbs automatic or making Reinhardt's shield a toggle rather than button hold.
2 - Zarya Bubble Shields. As someone who plays a bunch of Zarya I'm probably cutting my own throat here, but it needs to be said. Her shields, either on herself or projected onto teammates, give complete invulnerability to all damage and crowd control for about 2 seconds. As far as I'm aware they can't be broken by damage unlike a Reinhardt shield or a Winston dome. What's more, any damage they do block charges up Zarya's weapon. So for the love of God, do not shoot enemies with the shield on them. It does nothing but waste your ammo and turn the enemy Zarya into a monster.
3 - The flipside of the previous point is that if you are Zarya you can get easy charge off damage sources that the enemy can't control. For example, pop your shield and stand in front of a Torbjron turret. Or if a DVa ult comes in pop your shield, shield someone else and give the exploding mech a hug. Bam. Instant 100% charge.
4 - Attacks that do not use projectiles cannot be deflected by Genji or absorbed by DVa's defense matrix. This includes Mei's ice spray (but not her secondary fire icicles), Zarya's beam (unsure about her secondary fire), Symmetra's primary beam and mini-turret lasers, Winston's Tesla gun and any kind of melee attack.
5 - Armour. Some heroes have parts of their health bar coloured yellow. That represents armour. Armour HP gives a flat 5 damage reduction to each instance of incoming damage. This makes it highly effective against heroes who do incremental amounts of damage like Winston, Tracer or Symmetra. (So if the enemy is doing the five Winston cheese just pull out a bunch of DVas. She have 400 armour, making her incredibly hard to kill with Winston.) Note that armour does not reduce the damage of each projectile from shotgun blasts, but does do so for each projectile of burst weapons (Genji's shuriken and Lucio's primary fire).
6 - Abilities that prevent you from moving can be used while falling. Notably Roadhog's self-heal and Bastion's transformations and self heal. I like to drop down on enemies from above while activating Bastion's ult or turret mode so the transformation happens in mid air and I'm ready to fire when I hit the ground.
7 - Pharah's concussive shot and Junkrat's mine knock back the person firing them as well as enemies. So if you need to escape from a close quarters situation you can pop one of those suckers at your feet to create distance. Junkrat's own mine will not hurt him and can be used like a rocket jump.
8 - Symmetra's secondary charged shot goes straight through Reinhardt's shield. Good for countering Reinhardts pushing choke points. (Duh.) Reinhardt's own firestrike projectile does the same thing, and also pierces multiple targets.
9 - Mei can reach elevated locations by spawning an ice wall under her own feet. Can also be used to give allies a boost, although that would take a bit of coordination.
10 - Zenyatta cannot be damaged or stunned while his is ulting, but he can be knocked back. You can use a Reinhardt charge, a Pharah concussive blast or similar ability to separate him from his team and deny them the healing effect.
11 - Hanzo's dragon ult can be countered, but only under specific circumstances. When Hanzo ults he fires an arrow that travels about 7 meters before spawning the dragons. The dragons can't be stopped by anything but the initial arrow can neutralized by a DVa or deflected by a Genji for massive style points.
12 - Genji can deflect McCree's stun grenade, the bullet from McCree's ult, the rockets from Pharah's ult and the shrapnel from Roadhog's ult. (Unsure about Reaper ult or Tracer ult.)
13 - Junkrat's Rip-Tire can climb walls. Works the same way as Genji and Hanzo's wall climb abilities.
14 - Reinhardt's ult and the effects of Mei's ult can be blocked by an enemy Reinhardt's shield, Mei's ice wall or Winston's shield dome.
15 - Symmetra's primary beam does increased rate of damage the longer it is hitting someone. There is a charge indicator on the back of her weapon. The damage increase dissipates over time if you stop firing, stop hitting a target or stop to reload but does not go away instantly. This means you can reload or switch targets and maintain heavy damage output.
Hopefully this helps some folks. If anyone has their own to share or can confirm any of the stuff I was unsure of, feel free to share.
